How To Paint Eddie Van Halen's Frankenstrat Guitar: Step 7: Applying Red Coat

Awesome! So know you have something that looks like this!

Now the fun part! Pull that tape off!! BUT WAIT!! ***CAREFUL*** I know you are excited! I was too! But let's do this right before we peel off the entire white coat along with the tape.

The trick to pulling off the tape is to use your razor and lightly score the edges of the tape. Even if you have taped things before and pulled the tape off no problem, JUST DO THIS! It's not that hard and doesn't take much time. So, score the edge of the tape ensuring the paint is not attached to the tape and pull up the tape lightly and slowly. If at any point, the paint starts coming up, reach for your razor and score it again. If the paint does come up beyond repair, .....give it another coat of white.... I know it sucks, but you've made it this far!

Once you have the tape up, your guitar should look like this!

MAGIC! ... Well not quite but it looks so amazing right?! ...Okay moving on...

Next, reach for your tape again and let's lay out the next masking pattern. Check mine out and copy if you'd like. Keep in mind, wherever you want a BLACK line on the end result, be SURE to mask THAT BLACK LINE ON THIS STEP. A brains lip here means no black line on the reveal. I made the mistake of masking just ABOVE the third black stripe on the horn and therefore, I painted right over it. See the end result and you will know what I mean. Also notice on the bottom and side, I created a little wavy design. IT was easy to do and you can be creative. And lastly, don't forget to put a stripe around the perimeter of the guitar as shown slightly on the second picture. You can see the end result in the next step to see what I mean.